WELCOME EVENING

Cane sugar, margarin, soya flour, water. Dried lavender buds, spelt, baking powder, lemon skin, a hint of salt. Mixing, caressing, stretching, heating and eating. A walk, a book, a tea, knitting needles. Recipe for tonight as home is scented with these violet dreamers of a plant in the air.

Kind end of summer evening spells to dear you,

Anna Emilia

LIGHTNINGS OR THE LIGHT FROM A TOWER

Waves, hills, open skies. Driftwood, high tides, hay in the sea. Small stones swinging in the waves on the shore of white sand. Black summer nights. A bit of holiday memories of this Thursday when it starts to smell slightly like autumn. Evenings are more silent and I started to knit again one old pile of black thread.

It was very stormy yesterday. The night before the bedroom was lighten by lightnings. I stared to think that the house is by a lighthouse and the light comes from its tower.

"Isn´t it hard to pedal in this wind?" asked the lady with beautiful deep voice in her flower shop yesterday as I put the Lavender, Mums and Houseleek that I bought from her to my bicycle. It was downhill all the way home, a downhill with a lavender scent.

Happy weekend dear all of you with long walks, reading and baking!

P.S. Thank you dearly for mentioning my work on your blogs, for your written words and your purchases (I am packing them as soon as I have had a lunch on the balcony next to the lavender).

STRAWBERRY CLEARING, MANSIKKA-AHO

A week with my parents at their strawberry fields which are where my grandparents live. Open-air theater, forest paths, tickling grass under bare toes, hot sun, raspberry bushes, one very strong thunder night. Reading under gazebo´s shadow, watching people picking up strawberries for the coming winter and helping whatever there is needed. One small rabbit always lost in his paths on the yard, fresh basil to be dried for the winter´s dinners. When hungry, hiding in the strawberry fields for a while and eating a handful of the sweetest tastes.

This summer has been very warm, it made me to forget to drink tea. Today I am enjoying a cup of it again and gazing if long waited rain or a blow of wind finally arrives. The radio plays old summer songs and I have a blank white cotton paper in front of me, watercolors accompanying.

Happy August, happy new week, lovely to have you here!

P.s. Please have a look for Kerstin´s book with beautiful thoughts.

RED CLOVERS FOR THE BIRTHDAY GIRL WITH 90 YEARS

Last Saturday, a thunder stormy night, under a summerhouse ceiling listening to pine tree cones drumming the beat of the thunder. Viiru meowing on the ladders outdoor with wet paws, the next moment sleeping next to my legs. On Sunday, 90th birthday of my grandmother, it became sunny and surprise guests brought laughter, delicious food with bonfire and swimming.

On Monday I traveled to the strawberry fields of childhood through the most hidden curvy roads filled with small wooden houses, villas and swimming pond landscapes. Today one liter of raspberries, 5 liters of strawberry juice to be kept for the winter´s white blankets. An outdoor theater by an old mill and a lake (with reflections of birch trees) in sunset and now some pink clouds greeting you with the last rays of the sun.

Good night, sleep tight with the summer greetings of mine!

WHILE CLOUDS ARE DRIFTING CLOSER

Salty face, splashes of the sea in the wind. Sandwiches filled with pecan nuts, green bell pepper, onion, olives and sweetest cucumber in a small grey backpack. Mind is still on this small island (and ears still hear the wind and the roars of the sea), hands painting on a satin cotton paper.

Have a pleasant weekend with a strawberry cake!

WIND WAS STRONG, BUT WE FOUND NESTS TO HIDE

Bare feet walking on white sand and shallow waves, wind blowing. Lighthouses appearing from behind mountains or top of them. Walking over a half desert peninsula to find on the other side the highest solitary waves, playing in them. Jumping and being thrown down to the sea bottom, feeling the power of the turquoise sea.

Jasmin was the scent of the air on our walks, the taste of the sweetest mangos in our mouths. A new magical island.

Yesterday I returned home to another kind of hot summer evenings. Everything is old, familiar and dear, but it feels also very new the same time. Trips could still last forever. Moments to breath, hold memories and remember new thoughts that they won´t disappear.

It looks like thunder here, but the weather might be just tricking me. The sky could be soon again filled with the tickling whiskers of the sun. I am settling down slowly, but the shop is again open. Thank you to everyone who has wrote me during these weeks, I will answer you very soon.

Hello dear all of you, how is your season? How are you? So happy to meet you here again.

(First image taken by S.)

EARLY RENDEZVOUS, A FAREWELL FOR A WHILE

Hello dear all of you,

Early morning of the Midsummer Eve and a walk while everyone else were still asleep. All silent, but the summer wind and Mr. Bunny, who I met many times on different paths. He was certainly having the most fresh breakfast of dandelions and a bit of the flowers of the allotment garden. Then we met on a meadow and I was already sure that he had marked the same route to his unplanned morning walk map.

Vanya won the give-away, congratulations! I will send it to you after my holiday as I still did not reach you. Thank you to everyone for writing your messages and wishes, every one of them I read carefully and keep in my mind, being so happy about them.

A bag is filled with a summer book and small provisions, in the afternoon I will travel 1937 kilometers away. Then on Monday some 4016 km more. We will meet in August again!

Bonfires, summer lake waves, warm forests with wood-sorrels and meadows of green to you,

Please be well,

Anna Emilia